London, United Kingdom

British Literature and the Birth of Mass Media: Victorian Periodical to Modernist Magazine

One of the first forms of mass media, the power of the periodical was tremendous. It shaped readerships, politics, morality, and some of our best-loved works of fiction. With a focus on literary magazines, this module allows students to engage with literature in its original published form and to work with original artefacts. In the first week, students will be given the intellectual and practical tools needed to handle and interpret physical and digitised periodicals through a series of seminars and workshops. Students will then have two weeks of seminars, workshops and excursions based around Victorian and Modernist periodicals, discovering familiar names in new contexts.

Course leader

Dr Hugh Foley, Dr Matthew James Holman

Target group

This is a level one module (equivalent to first year undergraduate). No prior subject knowledge is required to study this module but students are expected to have a keen interest in the subject area. Students must have completed at least one year of undergraduate study by the start of the module in order to enroll.

Course aim

Upon successful completion of this module, students will:

Understand the importance of the periodical form and be able to handle digital periodical collections.
Have a working knowledge of the history of periodical publishing from the seventeenth through to the twenty-first century.
Have looked in detail at canonical texts by Charles Dickens, James Joyce and Virginia Woolf in their original periodical contexts.
Have acquired the skills to carry out individual research into periodical cultures
Be familiar with some of the major trends in modern scholarship on periodical literature in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries

Credits info

7.5 EC
7.5 ECTS / 4 US / 15 UCL

Fee info

GBP 2350: Students who study for 6 weeks (2 modules) will receive a tuition fee discount.
GBP : Students have the option of staying in UCL Accommodation close to campus in vibrant central London.